The Texas Seven
The I-35 Robber |gender = All male |birth date = November 6, 1971 September 13, 1977 September 10, 1963 October 3, 1961 May 18, 1962 May 6, 1970 October 29, 1962 |birth place = San Antonio, Texas McKinney, Texas Danville, Illinois Dallas, Texas Albuquerque, New Mexico El Paso, Texas |death date = December 4, 2018 January 22, 2001 February 4, 2015 February 29, 2012 August 14, 2008 |death place = Woodland Park, Colorado Huntsville, Texas |job = Former maintenance worker Former substitute teacher Former part-time bookstore clerk U.S. Army soldier Former construction worker Former restaurant owner |pathology = Unclassified Killers Cop Killers Killing Team Robbers Serial Rapist Stalker Rapist |mo = Shooting |victims = 1 killed 25+ hostages |status = Deceased Incarcerated }} The Texas Seven were a group of inmates who conducted the largest prison escape in Texas history on December 13, 2000, and embarked on a crime spree before being recaptured on January 21-23, 2001. Backgrounds Joseph Garcia Joseph Christopher Garcia was born on November 6, 1971, in San Antonio, Texas, to a middle-class family. He received a high-school education and married a young woman. As an adult, he developed a habit of drinking alcohol frequently and was arrested a few times for misdemeanors. At some point, he got a job as a maintenance worker at an airport hangar. One night in February 1996, Garcia was driving two of his friends home after a day of drinking at a bar. The trio became lost after one of them, Miguel Luna, provided incorrect directions. Garcia and Luna argued, which escalated into a fight that ended with Garcia stabbing Luna to death. Garcia was soon arrested and charged with Luna's murder; despite claiming self-defense, he was convicted and sentenced to fifty years in prison. Randy Halprin Randy Ethan Halprin was born on September 13, 1977, in McKinney, Texas. He and his brother Wesley were both abused by their parents, and eventually removed from their home in 1983 by Child Protective Services after the abuse was discovered. Both brothers were temporarily placed in foster homes before a couple, Daniel and Patricia Halprin, adopted them and gave them their current surnames. As a child, Halprin was intelligent, but started having problems with reality starting at the age of thirteen, and would often believe that aliens were landing. He was sent to a boarding school in Kentucky, but he was eventually expelled for disciplinary problems. Though they disowned him, Daniel and Patricia got Halprin an apartment in Kentucky and assisted him financially. However, Halprin wasted the money they sent him and soon became homeless. Returning to Texas, he stayed at a homeless shelter in Fort Worth. There, he befriended a group of other homeless people. Together, they purchased an apartment in the western side of the city using what little money they were able to acquire. One day in August 1996, Halprin was watching over a baby boy mothered by one of the members of his group, when the baby began to cry. The crying enraged Halprin, who had no experience with children. He snapped and began beating the infant; though he survived, the boy suffered multiple injuries, including broken limbs, several skull fractures, and a ruptured eardrum. Halprin was arrested and charged with attacking the boy. He pleaded guilty to causing serious bodily injury to a child, and was sentenced to thirty years in prison. Larry Harper Larry James Harper was born on September 10, 1963, in Danville, Illinois. When he was ten years old, Harper's mother divorced his father, a sergeant major with the U.S. Army Special Forces who served in the Vietnam War veteran, and left the family, leaving him and his brother to be raised by their father in military bases. However, Harper's father was more committed to his military career and barely had time to spend with him and his brother, causing Harper to develop a low self-worth and issues with abandonment. He attempted to follow in his father's footsteps, earning an associate degree in military science from a private school in Missouri, joining the U.S. Army Reserve, and receiving training in several fields. However, Harper fell short of his own expectations and chose to refocus his goals. He began attending the University of Texas in El Paso, Texas, in 1986 and majored in marketing. He received high grades in his classes and became recognized as an honors student. In addition to his schoolwork, he held down jobs as a substitute teacher and a part-time clerk at a bookstore. At some point, Harper began dating, but broke up with his girlfriend in the latter half of 1993 for unknown reasons, and began drinking heavily. Around that same period, he began a series of rapes near the university campus. He first repeatedly raped two women, the first on September 3 and the second on October 5. On the nights of October 31 and November 1, Harper peeped into the windows of two different women. He was caught by a security guard during the November 1 offense, and was found to be in possession of a screwdriver, a pair of scissors, and two rolls of electrical tape. Despite the confrontation, Harper managed to avoid going to jail. Three days later, he was observed peeping into another woman's window and unscrewing a light bulb on her porch, but avoided prosecution again. After taking a small hiatus, Harper returned to the residence of the woman he stalked during Halloween night, and raped her on March 23, 1994. He was subsequently arrested and connected to the other rapes and acts of voyeurism. Remorseful of his actions, he pleaded guilty to the charges against him and apologized to his victims. He was sentenced to fifty years in prison. Patrick Murphy Patrick Henry Murphy, Jr., was born on October 31, 1961, in Dallas, Texas, and was raised in the area. He enlisted in the U.S. Army, but was dishonorably discharged for repeated desertion. He then found a job as a construction worker. One night in 1984, Murphy attempted to burglarize the home of a former high-school schoolmate and her mother, but was found by the schoolmate. He threatened her into silence, then put a pillowcase over her head and raped her. After he left, the woman woke her mother up and told her she had been raped. She identified Murphy as her assailant to police based on his voice, and he was arrested. During the trial, there were questions about the idea of voice identification being admissible evidence, but Murphy was eventually convicted of aggravated sexual assault with a deadly weapon and burglary. He was sentenced to fifty years in prison. Donald Newbury Donald Keith Newbury was born on May 18, 1962, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He racked up a criminal record in Texas consisting of armed robberies, and was suspected to have committed over a dozen from 1986 to 1987. After being paroled for his second offense in the early 1990s, he moved in with a woman and her two children living in a rural area outside of Austin. Acquaintances described him as likable and attempting to go straight after living a life of crime. However, he faced difficulties in getting a job, and had to be brought in on a parole violation after becoming a laborer for an ex-felon. On July 18, 1997, Newbury, armed with a sawed-off shotgun, robbed an inn off Interstate 35 in Austin. He was identified by police through a surveillance tape from the inn, arrested, and imprisoned. George Rivas George Angel Rivas, Jr., was born on May 6, 1970, in El Paso, Texas. His parents divorced when he was six years old, and he was sent to live with his grandparents. He developed a fascination with guns, going as far as to name his two dogs after gun manufacturers, and had aspirations of becoming a police officer. However, as he grew older, Rivas became interested in living a life of crime, and was sentenced to ten years of probation for robbery and burglary in 1989. He enrolled at the University of Texas in El Paso in 1992 and majored in general studies, but after three semesters, he dropped out in 1993. During that same time, he had begun a string of robberies in several states. On May 25, 1993, he and an accomplice attempted to rob a Toys "R" Us store and held eight employees hostage. However, a ninth employee escaped and alerted police, leading to a hostage situation. A SWAT team eventually breached the building and found Rivas hiding in an air conditioning duct, wearing a blond wig as a quick disguise. He was arrested; eventually convicted of several counts of aggravated armed robbery, aggravated kidnapping, and burglary; and sentenced to eighteen life terms, seventeen of which were to be run consecutively, for a total of 99 years. During his imprisonment at the John B. Connally Unit, Rivas eventually attained trustee status and found work in the prison's maintenance department, considered a highly sought-after duty assignment among inmates. Michael Rodriguez Michael Anthony Rodriguez was born on October 29, 1962, in San Antonio, Texas. He attended a Catholic high school and dreamed of opening his own restaurant. He succeeded with the help of his father, also the owner of his own business, and the restaurant was a success. Wanting to become a teacher next, Rodriguez began taking courses in education at Southwest Texas State University in San Marcos. There, he fell in love with a classmate and began devising a plan to kill his current wife Theresa, who he had become dissatisfied with, and who had two $150,000 life insurance policies listing him as her beneficiary. Rodriguez and his brother Mark, a low-end cocaine dealer, hired ex-convict Roland Ruiz to kill Theresa for $2,000. After several failed plots, the trio put their scheme into action in October 1992. As Rodriguez was pulling his car into the garage one evening, having taken Theresa to see a movie, Ruiz ran up to them and shot Theresa while she was still seated in the car. Eventually, Theresa's mother became suspicious of Rodriguez after he used the insurance money to buy new clothing and items, and kicked him out of the house. He eventually spent all of the money, and police tracked him and his accomplices down within days of Theresa's murder. Ruiz broke down and confessed to the murder, followed by Rodriguez. Both Rodriguez brothers received life sentences, while Ruiz received the death penalty. The Prison Escape At some point, the seven congregated at the John B. Connally Unit and began hatching an escape plan under the supervision of Rivas. It is unknown when they began planning an escape, but some suspected that preparations took them at least a year. On December 13, 2000, at 11:20 a.m., guards and supervisors returned nearly two dozen inmates assigned to the maintenance department to their housing areas, and then went to lunch. This left Rivas, Garcia, Halprin, Harper, and Newbury alone, as they had earlier convinced a maintenance supervisor, Patrick Moczygemba, to allow them to remain at the main department to wax and seal its floors, and also to eat there; Moczygemba allowed them to do so because they were all well-behaved, though he agreed to stay behind as well and watch over them. Meanwhile, Mark Burgess, another maintenance supervisor, allowed Murphy to assist the five inmates and join them for lunch. As for Rodriguez, he was let into the maintenance department after lying to the guards that he was assigned to pick up trash there; in reality, he positioned himself at a bench outside the department and acted as a lookout for his accomplices. The seven sprung their plan into motion at 11:30 a.m. when Rivas lured Moczygemba away from the office to a warehouse located at the backside of the department. There, the others subdued him, stole his clothes and items, tied him up and gagged him, and locked him in an electrical room. They stole two of Moczygemba's prison coats and two caps from his office; and used his keys to gain access to the sensitive tools room, where they stole several pairs of wire-cutting pliers, two hacksaws, a bolt cutter, and a utility knife. At this point, Rodriguez was allowed in on direct participation in the escape plan. The seven repeated this process with Burgess, another seven maintenance supervisors, two corrections officers, and three uninvolved inmates over a span of nearly two hours. At that point, one of the hostages managed to free himself from his restraints and freed the others. They tore the electrical conduit from the walls and used it to barricade the door in case the seven returned. When this became clear to the seven, they secured a cable to the door and used a winch to keep it closed, so none of the hostages would try to escape the electrical room and alert prison authorities. Afterwards, Rivas posed as a maintenance supervisor and informed officers that a skeleton crew of inmates would be returning to their job assignments once lunch was over, in order to put less scrutiny on the maintenance department and decrease the seven's chances of being found. Another member of the seven (it is unknown which one) posed as Moczygemba to make a head count, and was careful to include the three subdued inmates and Rodriguez, who did not work in the maintenance department with the others, to ensure that it would be balanced. The seven, still posing as maintenance supervisors, then called corrections officers Lou Gips and Vernon Janssen and convinced them that employees would be entering their areas to install video monitors there. Meanwhile, one of the seven's hostages set off a fire alarm inside the electrical room as a last-ditch effort to alert prison authorities. A corrections officer saw the alarm in the central control panel and made several unsuccessful attempts at contacting the maintenance department, but he assumed it was a false alarm and silenced it. At 1:40 p.m., Rivas, Halprin, Murphy, and a fourth inmate (it is unknown which one of the seven) arrived at the back-gate picket area where Gips was assigned, using a stolen department utility vehicle. Gips allowed the undisguised Murphy and the other inmate through the walk-through gate into a fenced area located behind the gatehouse; the two had earlier innocently followed prison procedure and used the pedestrian gate instead of staying on the utility vehicle. Gips then allowed Rivas and Halprin into the area through the vehicle gate, but did not check their forms of identification, a violation of prison policy. The four then entered the sally port gatehouse where Janssen was assigned, and met up with Janssen. Janssen's attempt at requesting identification was delayed when one of the three inmates who had remained behind at the maintenance department called the gatehouse, posing as a maintenance supervisor who wanted to know if the four had arrived at the back-gate. Moments after, the four subdued Janssen, stole his clothes, restrained and gagged him, and locked him inside the restroom. Halprin then gained access to the radio tower through Gips and, while Gips was distracted, grabbed a .357-caliber revolver lying on a nearby desk. He held Gips at gunpoint and forced him to open the picket door and vehicle gate using the controls. He then had Gips show him the armory at the bottom of the tower before tying him up with his own belt and shoestrings. Next, he stole the weapons in the armory, which included a 12-gauge Remington pump-action shotgun with fourteen rounds of ammunition, a .223-caliber AR-15 Colt Sport Target Model assault rifle with fifteen rounds, and total of fourteen .357 Magnum Smith & Wesson Model 67 revolvers with a total of 210 rounds. Finally, he called the three inmates at the maintenance department to inform them that it was safe to move out. These three picked up the other four in a stolen pickup truck, and together, they left the prison. The breakout was first officially reported by Gips, who had managed to break free from his restraints. A police officer who was with the warden overheard Gips' distress call over the radio and notified others in the local law enforcement community to be on the lookout for the seven's truck. Manhunt and Crime Spree Within one hour, local authorities, along with the Karnes County Sheriff's Department, the Texas Highway Patrol, and other Texan law enforcement agencies, became involved in the manhunt. Every corrections officer from the prison was dispatched to Texas Highway 99, which runs northeast and southeast and connects to major interstates, to be on the lookout for the seven. Motorists heading to and from the area were stopped along every road, with their forms of identification checked and their car trunks searched. In the aftermath of the breakout, prison authorities found three notes left by the seven: one that criticized Texas's harsh prison system and talked about starting a revolution within the John B. Connally Unit, another that quoted the song Me and Bobby McGee, and a third that stated, "You haven't heard the last of us, yet..." At 4:00 p.m., the seven's stolen pickup truck was found behind a Wal-Mart store in Kenedy, Texas. Video footage from a nearby automated teller machine was examined, and they deduced, from two other vehicles seen around the same time as the pickup, that the seven had outside help. Meanwhile, the seven spent the night at San Antonio, having presumably taken U.S. Route 181 to get there. However, because their limited supply of stolen cash was already running out, they headed east to Houston and stopped at Pearland, a Houston suburb, where they came across a Radio Shack store. Rivas and Newbury entered the store, interacted with employee Michael Drab, used the restroom, and left. They then returned before closing time and held Drab, the three other employees, and two customers hostage. At one point during the robbery, they were walked in by Michael's father Jim, who they also took hostage. In the end, Rivas and Newbury fled with thousands of dollars, walkie-talkies, other electronic equipment, and police scanners, and left their hostages inside a bathroom. The employees later described Rivas and Newbury as being unusually friendly during the entire event. After the robbery, the seven headed towards the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex and hid at a motel in Farmers Branch, an inner-ring suburb of Dallas, while the U.S.-Mexico border stepped up security under the expectation that the escapees would attempt to go through it. Aftermath Modus Operandi During the escape from John B. Connally Unit, the seven timed the first phase of their plan during the lunch hours and at count time, described as the slowest period of the prison day; there was less surveillance of certain locations, such as the maintenance area, during this time as well. One of them would call someone over, usually a civilian maintenance supervisor, whereupon at least one other would strike this person on the head from behind, knocking him unconscious, or otherwise assault him, hold him at knifepoint, and threaten him into submission. Once each victim was knocked unconscious, the seven would tie him up, gag him, and place him in an electrical room behind a locked door. They also stole clothing, credit cards, and objects of identification from these men. Afterwards, the group impersonated prison officers on the phone and would create false stories to ward off suspicion from prison authorities at large. After this, four of the seven, disguised as civilians, went to the back gate of the prison under the pretense of installing video monitors there. Once they gained access to the gatehouse, they would subdue any present guards, raid the guard tower, and steal numerous items and weapons. The other three would make calls to the other tower guards to distract them; they then stole a prison maintenance pickup truck, which they would drive to the back gate of the prison and use to pick up their accomplices, then escape. Known Victims Separate Crimes *Unspecified dates in Texas: **1981, Austin: A victimless armed robbery committed by Newbury **1984, Dallas: Unnamed 23-year-old woman **1987, Austin: A victimless armed robbery committed by Newbury **1989, El Paso: A victimless robbery and burglary committed by Rivas *1992, El Paso, Texas: **October: Theresa Rodriguez, 30 **October 3: Unnamed Radio Shack salesman **October 23: Unnamed Checker Auto Parts salesman **Early November: Several unnamed Oshman's Sporting Goods employees *1993, El Paso, Texas: **May 12: Several unnamed Furr's employees **May 25: Eight unnamed Toys "R" Us employees **The rapes and stalkings by Harper: ***September 3: Unnamed woman ***October 5: Unnamed woman ***November 1: Unnamed woman ***November 4: Unnamed woman *March 23, 1994, El Paso, Texas: Unnamed woman *1996, Texas: **February, San Antonio: Miguel Luna **August, Fort Worth: Unnamed baby boy *July 18, 1997, Austin, Texas: A victimless armed robbery at a La Quinta Inn *Notes: **Newbury is also suspected of committing approximately twelve other armed robberies from 1986 to 1987, but not confirmed for any of them. These included robberies at three hotels, a taxicab, two surplus stores, and a bus. These robberies were what earned him the moniker of "The I-35 Robber". **Rivas is also suspected of committing several robberies in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, but not confirmed for any of them. Mutual Crimes *2000: **December 13, near Kenedy, Texas: Sixteen hostages taken in the John B. Connally Unit escape: ***Patrick Moczygemba ***Alejandro Marroquin ***Alan Camber ***Mark Burgess ***Manuel Segura ***Ronny Haun ***Mark Garza ***Martin Gilley ***Terry Schmidt ***David Cook ***Roger Fishwick ***Randy Albert ***Lester Moczygemba ***Ambrosio Martinez ***Vernon Janssen ***Lou Gips **December 14, Pearland, Texas: The Radio Shack robbery committed by Rivas and Newbury : ***Michael Drab, 19 ***Doug Watson ***Two unnamed employees ***Two unnamed customers ***Jim Drab, 53 **December 24, Irving, Texas: ***The Oshman's Sporting Goods store robbery committed by three of the seven : ****Wesley Farris ****An unnamed employee ****Several unnamed employees ***Officer Aubrey Hawkins, 29 On Criminal Minds *Season Eleven **"The Storm" - While the Texas Seven have yet to be directly mentioned or referenced on the show, they appear to have been an inspiration for the Virginia Anarchists and to a lesser extent their leader, Eric Rawdon - Both were criminal groups who staged an elaborate escape attempt, attacked prison employees, stole their clothing to impersonate them and complete certain tasks, and intended to sneak out of their respective prisons by using said disguises. In addition, both groups were able to launch successful ambushes against at least one police officer (although the Texas Seven did successfully escape, while the Anarchists failed to break out Rawdon, although their attack did ultimately lead to thirteen other criminals escaping). Sources *Wikipedia's article on the Texas Seven *TruTV Crime Library's articles about the Texas Seven *Murderpedia articles: **Joseph Garcia **Randy Halprin **George Rivas Category:Stubs Category:Real People Category:Real World Criminals Category:Real Life Cop Killers Category:Real Life Rapists Category:Real Life Killers Category:Real Bank Robbers Category:Real Killing Teams Category:Real Criminal Organizations Category:Incarcerated Real World Criminals Category:Unreferenced Criminals